Good morning, everyone. My name is Indira Diaz, Cementos Argos, IR, and I welcome you to our second quarter results release. On the call today are Juan Esteban Calle, our CEO, Felipe Aristizábal, our CFO, Maria Isabel Echeverri, the VP of Legal Affairs, Camilo Restrepo, the President of the Cement Business in the US, Carlos Yusty, the VP of the Colombia division, and Gustavo Uribe, the General Manager of Argos Panamá and Central America. Please note that certain forward-looking statements and information during the call or in the reports and presentation uploaded at www.argos.co/ir are related to Cementos Argos S.A. and its subsidiaries, which are based on the knowledge of current facts, expectations, circumstances, and assumptions of future events. Various factors may cause Argos future results, performance or accomplishments to differ from those expressed herein. The forward-looking statements are made to date, and Argos does not assume any obligation to update said statements in the future as a result of new information, future events, or any other factors. Today, after the initial remarks, there will be a Q and A session. If you have a question, please raise your hand by pressing the icon at the bottom of your screen at any time during the conference. We will record this Q and A session and upload it in our webpage. It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to Mr. Calle. Thank you, Indira, and good morning, everyone. The sound execution of an ambitious pricing strategy, together with the hedging of a significant portion of our fuel matrix and our ability to adapt the supply chain to the challenges of each market, delivered strong results in our consolidated financials. Our average prices increased year-over-year, up to 28% in cement and up to 16% in ready-mix concrete, accompanied by a strong evolution of volumes, especially in the U.S. and in Colombia. Total volumes stood at 4.2 million tons of cement and 2 million m³ of ready-mix concrete during the quarter, resulting in a 6.2% like-for-like growth in cement when excluding the trading business and a 13.4% comparable growth in ready-mix versus the same quarter of last year. As a result, our revenues achieved a new all-time high record of COP 2.9 trillion, increasing 15.3% versus the second quarter of 2021. Our adjusted EBITDA stood at COP 525 billion, improving 2.6% versus 2021, aligned with our quarterly budget and remains on track with our full year guidance. Cost inflation and difficulties in the logistics chain due to strong demand and the shortage of man hours on markets were the main challenges during the quarter. We estimate that our hedging contracts in fuels contributed to savings of around COP 84 billion along our footprint on the second quarter when comparing our fixed prices versus the spot price of the market. Nevertheless, the total cost of sales presented an increase of COP 350 billion, of which COP 105 billion were directly related to the inflationary effects on fuel and energy in our three regions. Additional impacts related to higher volumes, raw materials and maintenance also affected this figure during the quarter. We remain committed with our sustainability goals and our recently announced ambitions of achieving the production of 3 million tons per annum of calcined clays by 2030. In that regard, I would like to mention that we have decided to start a pilot for testing our technology in the U.S.. I would like to invite Camilo to provide more context on this achievement and on the overall performance of the region. Thank you, Juan, and good morning, everyone. During the second quarter, we were remarkably successful at offsetting the inflationary pressures by partially transferring these cost increases to our customers via permanent price adjustments and temporary fuel fees, by hedging a substantial portion of our energetics and by leveraging our robust supply chain network to take advantage of the strong demand while lessening the impact of labor shortages affecting the transportation industry countrywide. A second price increase in both cement and ready-mix was carried out during June, in addition to the fuel surcharge in both products that we continued to transfer to our customers during the quarter. Our average FOB quarterly prices increased 10% in cement and 12.4% in ready-mix year-over-year, setting again a record high in our recent history in the U.S.. Additionally, to the date of this call, we have executed a third price increase in both cement and ready-mix of mid-single digits applicable from July on, which has been carefully planned and executed to achieve the consolidated EBITDA guidance that we have provided to the market. We have executed our pricing strategy focused on offsetting inflation, and will continue to do so during the rest of the year. In terms of demand, we experienced a strong performance along our footprint. Our like-for-like volumes increased 6.4% year-over-year in cement, driven mostly by Florida and the Carolinas. On the ready-mix business, our volumes increased 6.4% on a comparable basis versus 2021, with Georgia and the Carolinas exhibiting the best performance because of the unaltered availability of materials like rock and sand, which were difficult to procure in other markets such as Texas and Florida due to unforeseen supply issues and high demand in general. Good weather conditions during the second quarter were also important to achieve this volume increase. The backlog had a positive evolution during the quarter and achieved in June an improvement of 2.4% versus May, which we consider as a signal of the continuation of the solid demand for the following months. Our hedging strategy in energy proved to be effective, as we saved during the quarter around $11 million versus spot prices. Nevertheless, we experienced year-over-year cost increases of around 9.4% in the unitary cost of cement and 15.1% in the unitary cost of ready-mix, mainly affected by fuel and energy, with an estimated impact of $7.5 million for the quarter when compared to the same period of last year. For the remainder of the year, we have hedged 60% of the coal, 65% of the gas, and 60% of the diesel forecasted consumption, assuring an important portion of the demand, but leaving, at the same time, some room to capture possible spot prices improvements in the following months. In terms of EBITDA, I would like to highlight the upward monthly trend observed during the second quarter, which led us to achieve on June the highest monthly EBITDA in our history in the U.S., with a 17% increase versus June 2021, supported by the implementation of our pricing initiatives, our hedging strategy, and the positive market dynamics in our footprint. The adjusted EBITDA for the quarter stood at $75 million, flat versus last year's results with an adjusted EBITDA margin of 18.1%, 210 basis points lower than 2021 because of the increase in unitary costs. Additionally, our PLC brand, EcoStrong, is making important progress. As of June, ahead of our initial deployment strategy and in line with our commitment, the Roberta plant has now fully converted to PLC. For the second semester, Harleyville and Newberry will also be fully converted. Based on PLC adoption in our markets, interest from our clients in a sustainable future, we want to continue leading, the company has decided to test and introduce our calcined clay technology in our markets. We have conducted pilot industrial production runs and internal tests and will continue to do so under controlled conditions. Regarding market dynamics, as discussed before, we continued to observe a strong demand during the second quarter, and we expect this trend to continue during the second half of the year, supported by the dynamics observed in our markets, projects being carried out, and the strength of our backlog. We keep on closely monitoring all the market variables and their foreseeable impact in our business while remaining confident about the midterm potential of the country based on the existing gaps in housing and infrastructure in the states where we operate. Thank you, Camilo. The combination of our existing capabilities in both commercial and operational performance, together with our ambition to expand the calcined clay technology into the U.S., will play a key role in our future performance in the region. Now moving to Colombia, I would like to highlight the unparalleled commitment of this team, which has been agile, resilient, and flexible to adapt to the challenging industry and global trends while delivering outstanding results. Carlos Horacio Yusty will now provide additional color on this region. Thank you, Juan, and good morning. The solid market dynamics continued during the second quarter of the year, supported by the retail segment, residential construction, and infrastructure projects. Industry cement dispatches grew over 12% versus the same period of last year, which was affected in May by social instability in the country. Additionally, the price environment was strong during the period. Throughout the year, the company has been successfully deploying its commercial strategy by increasing prices in the entire portfolio and in every region of the country with a differentiated approach in terms of timing and magnitude considering the competitive landscape in each market. This approach has demonstrated to be appropriate, and it has allowed us to more than offset the inflationary pressures while capturing more volume within a context of a strong demand. Local prices for cement posted a 14% year-over-year increase and reached the highest FOB price in COP in the history of the company. On the same line, ready-mix prices rose 8% year-over-year, also reaching an all-time high price. The strong demand conditions led to a 12% year-over-year growth in cement volume for the local market. Exports from Cartagena increased 21% compared to the same period of last year, resulting from our strategy to replace trading volumes with our own production due to the high prices of clinker and cement worldwide. In the cement line, we plan to restart our second kiln in Toluviejo during the third quarter with an additional capacity of 200,000 tons of clinker per year and a total investment of around $7 million. The project, which started its execution at the end of last year, will allow us to attain our goal of exporting 1.3 million tons of cement from Colombia during 2022, an increase of approximately 30% versus the exported volumes from last year that will replace additional volumes from third parties in the CCA region. The favorable dynamics on the residential and infrastructure segments and the lower comparison base led to a 25% year-over-year growth on the ready-mix volumes during the quarter, ratifying the full recovery of the business. As expected, cost inflation remained the main challenge for our operations. During the quarter, we were mainly focused on containing the steep hike in the cost of energetics and procuring enough fuels in a local context of scarcity. Our team successfully tackled these issues by modifying our kilns and our fuel matrix. This modification also entailed careful planning of our logistics network to ensure the supply of materials from longer distances into our plants. To the date of this call, we have modified the source of around 70% of our coal purchases in the country to reduce the cost impact and ensure the permanent availability of fuels. Unit cost increased 31% in the cement business and 5.4% in the ready-mix business, impacted mainly by COP 67 billion of higher cost in energy and fuels. For the second semester, we expect a more stable cost structure, as we have successfully fixed the price of around 60% of our coal and 70% of the gas needed by our cement operation. Additionally, we have already performed an important portion of the programmed maintenance activities, so we expect lower fixed costs for the rest of the year. The previously mentioned effects of the strong price and volume momentum and our successful cost control initiatives led to an EBITDA growth of 28% year-over-year, when excluding the results from the exports division. Overall, EBITDA reached COP 136 billion, which is 13% higher compared to the same period of last year. EBITDA margin was 20.1% on the quarter and posted a decrease of 257 basis points based on the increase of unitary costs. We would also like to highlight the positive evolution of our aggregates business, which has been consistently improving, and its EBITDA during the first semester nearly doubled versus the same period of last year. Regarding market conditions, the residential segment in Colombia continues with encouraging indicators, especially on social housing. During the first semester of the year, social and non-social housing sales grew 7% and 1% respectively year-over-year, as a continuation of the upward trend evidenced since fourth quarter of 2020. Housing starts reached 10.5 million m² during the last twelve months, growing 17% year-over-year and posting the highest levels in seven years, while the finished housing inventory is 35% lower and rotation is below 10 months in the main cities. In connection with the development of the residential segment in the country and supported by our higher purpose of making possible the construction of housing and infrastructure dreams that enable a more sustainable, prosperous, and inclusive society, we have inaugurated a plant of modular construction near Bogotá that will allow us to produce houses in series with benefits in terms of cost and time for the end users. The plant that has an investment of COP 17 billion during 2021 will produce around 400 houses during the current year, with additional investment could grow up to 4,000 houses in 2025. On infrastructure projects, 4G continues positively advancing, reaching around 65% overall progress with 10 projects completed, 17 in construction phase, and two that have not yet begun. Regarding 5G, the process advances satisfactory as six projects has been already awarded, and two others are on their bidding process. Regarding the Bogotá Metro, we have currently supplied 35% of the projected demand for the Patio Talleres, where we are exclusive suppliers of the ready-mix concrete. We expect to complete this project by November 2022, and the next phase of the Metro to be in construction during 2022 and 2023, where we expect to play an important role given our comprehensive portfolio of products and services. Overall, we expect the solid performance of the country experienced during the last years to continue as ongoing projects are finalized, but the roads project pipeline supports demand. For the rest of 2022, our outlook is positive, given the solid demand conditions in both cement and ready-mix evidenced during the first semester, which are expected to continue, supported by the residential and infrastructure segment. We remain focused on value maximization and growth, taking advantage of our national presence and contributing to the development and competitiveness of the country. Thank you, Carlos. Moving on to the Caribbean and Central America region, I would like to highlight the effort from our team to increase pricing in countries that are more exposed to inflationary pressures. Gustavo will provide additional information on this subject. Thank you, Juan, and good morning, everyone. During the second quarter of 2022, the solid pricing dynamic throughout the region allowed us to alleviate inflationary pressures. Cement prices grew 28% year-over-year, and posted for the second straight quarter, a double-digit sequential improvement. The important yearly growth was a combination of rising prices across the board and an important reduction in trading volumes, which have lower prices. Local market cement dispatches improved in comparison to the first quarter of 2022, but remained 5% lower due to the continuation of operational difficulties in Haiti and the governmental transition in Honduras. Meanwhile, trading volumes decreased 68% year-over-year, as the company has reduced opportunistic shipments for third parties due to the significant increase in international prices. We have prioritized exports from Cartagena to supply our local markets. In Honduras, we continue to successfully deploy our price recovery strategy, reaching a double-digit improvement year-over-year. Cement dispatches for the quarter were 18% lower versus the same period of last year, affected by a tough comparison base and by the period of transition of the new government elected in November 2021, which has slowed down public infrastructure and housing projects. The Dominican Republic continue with strong demand and pricing conditions, supported by a strong retail segment, housing projects, and the positive momentum of the economy associated mainly to tourism. This led to an all-time high EBITDA result in June. Additionally, the second quarter marked a new all-time high in cement dispatches, growing 5% year-over-year. Pricing dynamics were very strong, leading to a 20% year-over-year growth and reaching the highest price in 10 years. In Panama, cement volumes recovered significantly, posting a 13% growth compared to the same quarter of last year, as infrastructure projects such as third and first lines of the Panama Metro are gaining traction, and the recovery of the residential segment, especially in social housing, continues. During the first two quarters of the year, our operations in Haiti posted the largest price increase of the region, but our volumes were affected by the industry performance of the country that we estimate has decreased in cement dispatches around 38% versus the first semester of last year. In contrast, our volumes decreased during the second quarter 25% year over year, with an upward month-over-month trend leading to flattish monthly volumes during June when compared to the same month of 2021. We remain optimistic for the rest of the year based on the monthly evolution observed during the last quarter, as well as by the fact that the technical problems that we had in our operations were completely solved in June. Puerto Rico continues with a positive pricing dynamic with a double-digit growth. Cement volumes improved around 9% sequentially, but remained slightly below the same period of the last year due to a tough comparison base. Cost inflation also impacted the CCA region during the second quarter of the year. Unitary costs increased 20.8% in cement, mainly affected by an impact of $5 million in raw materials and $2 million in power and fuel. EBITDA closed at $32 million, 19% below the second quarter of last year, affected by the combination of lower volumes and the inflationary pressures that generate the cost impact across the region previously explained. In line with our constant quest for innovation, we successfully performed an industrial pilot of hydrogen injection in our Piedras Azules plant in Honduras. With this technology, the plant will increase its production by around 55,000 tons of clinker per year, reduce the petcoke consumption by around 2%, and increase the potential substitution of alternative fuels by 58%. Additionally, the optimization of these variables leads to lower CO2 emissions from the operation. We remain cautiously optimistic with our operations in the Caribbean, focused on offsetting inflation via pricing and managing efficiently our cost structure by sourcing as much cement and clinker as possible from our operations in Cartagena and Toluviejo, as well as by properly managing our fuel matrix. Thank you, Gustavo. Regarding our balance sheet, our net debt to EBITDA plus dividends ratio slightly increased during the quarter, closing at 3x, mostly affected by the inland sale from the Dallas divestiture that was carried out during the second quarter of 2021 and is no longer included in our last 12-month EBITDA. Also, higher cash outflow generated by the inflationary pressure affected the leverage ratio. In terms of guidance, based on the performance for operations during the second quarter and our forecast for the second half of the year, we would like to reaffirm the EBITDA guidance of between COP 2.05 trillion and COP 2.15 trillion for 2022, as well as the expected return of capital of around 10% for that same period. We are aware of the challenges currently faced by the countries where we operate, and we remain cautiously monitoring all the market variables, but fully confident about the potential of our markets in the midterm. Thank you all for your attention. Indeed, we can proceed now with the Q and A. Thank you, Juan. We will proceed then with the Q and A session. Please remember that in order to ask a question, you need to raise your hand using the icon that is at the bottom of your screen. I will say your name and company, and will enable your microphone. Take into account that you need to unmute your microphone before you speak. The first question comes from Vanessa Quiroga from Credit Suisse. Hi. Thank you. I hope you can hear me well. My question is mainly regarding the U.S., because we saw revenues going up high single-digit% year-over-year, while pricing is up about double-digit%. That implies, I'm imagining, a decline in volume. Wanted to get more details on what led to this implied decline in volumes year-over-year, and how you expect that to evolve going forward. The second part of that question would be more details about your pricing, your pricing announcements. Just to review what Argos has done in the U.S. in terms of pricing during the year, which months had pricing for which states, et cetera. Thank you. Thank you for your question, Vanessa. In reality, the performance of our volumes in the U.S. were very strong during the second quarter. I mean, cement volumes increased 6% versus the first quarter of last year. Our revenue management strategy in the U.S. has been extremely successful, and we, as Camilo mentioned during the call, made some additional price increases in July. The reality is that we are expecting a continuation of the good volumes in the U.S. in the second half of the year and an improvement in margins because of the additional price increases that we have in place. I don't know, Camilo, if you would like to add some color to the question of Vanessa. Well, Juan, I think that, you're right on the spot. The idea is, we'll continue to do all price adjustments to maintain profitability, and we have done so. We've been very successful at transferring inflationary cost to the market, and we still see very strong demand in the market, both in cement and ready-mix. We'll continue to perform in that way. Thank you, Camilo. Thank you, Vanessa, for your question. Thank you. Next question comes from Alberto Valerio from UBS. Hi. Thank you for taking my question. Hi, Juan and all Argos team. If you can give some update on the listing process that you mentioned on the release that you spent $4.1 million for in the quarter. How is the stage? When you expect it to be complete? And what would be the future projects in the U.S.? This is my first question. My second question is about the capacity in U.S. How much more can we expect Argos to expand capacity? The PLC cement can help on this? And if the DOT authority they also are more flexible about the clinker ratios for the infrastructure projects. That's my question. Thank you, everybody. Thank you, Alberto. In terms of the listing process, I mean, we remain fully committed. I mean, it is a strategic decision, but we cannot comment any further. In terms of our capacity in the U.S., we have been very successful in the conversion of our plants to PLC. Three of our four plants will have a 100% conversion to PLC before the end of the year, and the last one will be converting the first half of 2023. That will help with our capacity. The other strategies that we are advancing is the upgrade and the increasing capacity of inputs in our terminals, to be able to fulfill additional growth in demand going forward. Remember that we have close to 5 million tons of import capacity in our terminals in the U.S. In our opinion, that is a strategic advantage for Argos U.S. going forward. Thank you very much. Thank you, Alberto. To complement the answer regarding PLC, we have acceptance in all of our markets where we currently operate and sell. There's acceptance of PLC from DOT and most, well, in every DOT. We are monitoring and, of course, pushing for more flexibility in clinker, but there's still no more flexibility in clinker. That being said, we will continue push for the increase in use of the supplementary cementitious materials. This is also part of what we mentioned regarding our calcined clays, but we will also continue to work on our slag and other sources of cementitious materials. There we believe we can get also a little bit more capacity to producing in cementitious materials in the U..S. Fantastic. Very clear. Thank you, Camilo. Next question comes from Felipe Barragán from BTG. Yes. Hi, good morning. It's Gordon Lee. Can you hear me? Yes. Hi, Gordon. Yes, we can hear you. Yes. Good morning, Gordon. Hi, good morning. Yes, just two questions. The first on Cartagena and the second one on the balance sheet. I was wondering if you look at your volumes in the first half, and also considering the target that you mentioned for the year, what share of those exports is going to the U.S. and how much of that is going to markets in the CCA region. Then the second question on the balance sheet. I mean, obviously, you know, the cost of funding in Colombian pesos has increased pretty dramatically over the last several months and may rise further. If you look at your balance sheet, you're overexposed relative to your cash flow generations in terms of your leverage in Colombian pesos. I was wondering if you are thinking in any way of changing that balance, maybe more towards the dollar. If not, whether you're thinking about maybe more aggressive leverage reduction targets just to compensate for the lower coverage that the higher interest rates will produce. Thank you. Thank you, Gordon. I mean, nowadays Cartagena exports between 20% and 25% of our volumes to the U.S., but that is going to increase going forward. I mean, with the increasing capacity in our ports in the U.S., we expect Cartagena to move probably to exporting 30%-40% of our volumes to the U.S. In terms of our balance of debt between pesos and dollars and our strategy for financing going forward, I would like Felipe to give you more color. Sure. Hi, Gordon. Regarding your comments, you're right. We are overexposed to pesos. The reason behind that is that most of the deleveraging process has happened in the U.S. Going forward, I mean, we're currently working on balancing our debt portfolio to match our cash generation profile. Regarding the cost of our debt, approximately 40% of our debt is linked to the CPI in Colombia. That is the main reason behind the increasing interest expense. The remaining 60% is either fixed or linked to the short-term interest rate here in Colombia, which has increased but not dramatically as the CPI. I mean, we're working on both fronts. We are working on rebalancing our the currency profile of the portfolio, as well as reducing the total and gross level of indebtedness for the company going forward. We do expect the total debt for the company by the end of the year is definitely gonna be below the 3 x mark. Perfect. That's very clear. If I could just have a quick follow-up. When you said you're focusing on reducing the gross level of indebtedness. Mm-hmm. That's still mostly through growth in EBITDA and free cash flow, right? You're not going to re-engage in divestments at this point. That's correct. Yeah. At the moment, we are not pursuing any divestment across the portfolio. Most of the deleveraging process will come via free cash flow and initiatives other than divestments. Perfect. Thank you very much. Next question comes from Yassine Touahri from On Field. Yes. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Just one question on your U.S. operation. I understand that in June your EBITDA is up 17%. Does it mean that the price increase that you've implemented in July and in June are enough to fully pass on cost inflation? Does it mean that you're expecting the margin in the second part of the year, in H2 2022, to be stable in the U.S. versus last year? Could we see the margin pressure coming to an end in the U.S.? That would be my first question. A second question on your import in the U.S.. I think you are selling approximately 6 million tons of cement in the U.S.. Could you tell us what proportion is imported and what proportion is produced locally? And then a third question, which is related to your import. If you're going to 100% limestone cement, does it mean that you will be able to replace some of the expensive imports by local production, and improve your margin? Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Yassinne. Yes, as Camilo mentioned, I mean, June was our best month of EBITDA in the history of the company in the U.S. Margins are improving sequentially because of our pricing strategy, so you can expect better margins in the second half of the year. Could we see the margin in the second half of the year being better than the margin in the second half of last year? That is our expectation, Yassine Touahri. Yes, because with the revenue management strategies that we're already implementing in the U.S., yeah, margins are improving sequentially, so you can expect that. Regarding the other two questions, Camilo Restrepo will provide you the answers. Yassine, in terms of the PLC covering for imports, what we are aiming at is increasing total volume and total market share. We'll continue producing as much as we can in PLC. Conversion, as we said, is going better than our initial plan. We'll be 100% converted somewhere before half of 2023, as we have progressed very well. Then what we will do is continue doing imports as much as we can to supply our markets. One more thing is from the Cartagena operations, we will also convert type I, type II into PLC, so that's also going to help a little bit in cost all across. CEMEX mentioned that they were importing 30% of their volume in the U.S. Is it fair to assume that the proportion is the same for you, that you could import a bit less than 2 million tons in the U.S.? Well, currently we're importing around 15%-20% of our volumes. I would not say it's the same proportion as CEMEX. Yeah. That's very clear. Thank you very much for those details. Thank you. We are going to take now a question that we have on the chat, with Nick Lippman, who is having trouble with his microphone. He says, "Good morning. Thank you for the call and for taking my question. I'm having an issue with the microphone. This is why I'm asking here. When you sell blended cement PLC, how to price it versus traditional Portland cement, and how do you market it? Is it on quality, carbon footprint, or price? Nick, I would say that our promise to our clients has been that we would maintain same performance and quality as our traditional type one, type two. We've kept that promise with no quality issues so far. That's part of what we're saying, that we have had a very successful transition into PLC. We are also marketing our EcoStrong brand, which has both the quality and the carbon footprint sort of to it. On price, what we've done is we've done all the price adjustments that we have made necessary to maintain our margins this year and offset inflation. We will define what the marketing strategy or pricing strategy will be on the EcoStrong brand moving forward. Thank you, Camilo. Next question comes from Francisco Suarez from Scotiabank. Sorry. Sorry for that. Good morning, everybody. Thanks for the call. The question that I have is just to make sure that I understood correctly the differences on how you have been able to make sure that your plants in the U.S. can actually produce the new types of cement. Is it because of the potential differences on how you are able to source the limestone to those plants? Or it has more to do with any regulatory issues, if any, or it has to do more with commercial issues, if any? That's my first question. The second question on the calcined clay project in, and your pilot in the U.S., what do you think the struggles might be on the commercial side, the acceptance for that type of product? Secondly, what potential hurdles you may face from the regulatory side as well, and what other issues may come up from the technical side of things, given your experience on what you have done in Colombia, what are the issues or differences that you may expect to find in the U.S. compared to Colombia? Thank you. Thank you, Paco. We'll take your second question, and then Camilo will answer the first one. I mean, we believe that the future of cement in the U.S. will use calcined clay in a significant way, but we will have to wait until the DOT gets more flexible with the current standards of cement. In our first stage, what we are planning to is to replace basically slag in ready-mix with calcined clays. In our opinion, with the technical expertise that we have at our Rio Claro plant and the things that we have been able already to prove in the U.S., there is a significant opportunity for our business going forward. We are extremely excited with the results of our first trials, and we are fully committed to the goal that we mentioned at our investor day, that we plan to reach 3 million tons of calcined clay production by 2030. Camilo will answer your second question on the sequence of the adoption of PLC in our plants. Yeah. Paco, to complement Juan's answer, we are also targeting complementing supplementary cementitious usage in ready mixes. That's gonna be partially replacing slag or partially replacing fly ash with the scarcity of fly ash in the markets that will come through the powering down of the coal power plants. The market is going to face shortage on fly ash, and the alternative is cleaning out the pits and drying the fly ash that is stored there. But that also has a deadline on 2028, 2030, if I'm not mistaken, to be shut down, and there's no more usage of that fly ash. It will come into a replacement of supplementary cementitious material as such. There's of course the residential and commercial markets that can be or will be a target before DOT acceptance. We truly believe DOT will move forward in trying to understand and accept performance-based cements and of course ready mixes which are already there in some of the states. We believe there's sort of a movement that will go forward towards that, and also impelled a little bit by the reduction in CO2 emissions that the country needs as a whole. With regards to your first question on PLC production, there's no restriction on the limestone side supply. We have the same limestone that we use for clinker processes, the one that we use to produce PLC. It's more on a performance side that we have maintained that promise to our clients to make it the same. When you change from a 95% clinker, 5% gypsum, to an 85% or 80% clinker, limestone, and gypsum blend, what we want is our clients to have a seamless transition into using the same dosage of cement in their ready mixes for them to have the same performance in their ready mixes. That's what we've achieved. when I say that we have had a seamless and very satisfactory transition is that our clients are using the PLC product, the EcoStrong product, with no problems in their performance of the mixes, and such. Gotcha. Very clear. Thanks for the answers. Can I make just a brief follow-up to Juan on the calcined projects? It seems that technically, calcined clays have the opportunity to, I mean, to go basically with the overall electrification of clinker manufacturing as well because of the lower temperatures of the kiln. Would you be considering exploring at the same time the overall potential of electrification at the kiln level as well? Yes. Yes, sir. We are already doing that. Yeah. There is, I mean, very good potential in that. We are taking a very close look at that opportunity, Paco, for sure. Thank you so much. Take care, guys. Next question comes from Rodrigo Sanchez from Davivienda Corredores. Yes, good morning, and thank you for the presentation. I've got two questions. The first one is related to the tax reform. I would like to know what's your initial take on what the new government in Colombia presented. If approved, would you expect higher fuel prices, and in particular, those related to coal? My second question is, how much of the revenue generated in Colombia is coming from the free zones? Out of those revenues, what percentage is export related? Thank you. Thank you, Rodrigo. I mean, we are, you know, analyzing the tax reform. I mean, the wording presented to Congress still needs a lot of discussion. I mean, first, I mean, on the positive side, I mean, the size of the reform, COP 25 trillion instead of the COP 50 trillion that at some point was mentioned. Second, we are fully conscious that Colombia needs to close the social gap. That is a positive. Third, I mean, we need to put our fiscal accounts in order, and that is positive as well. I'm sure we will find space to give feedback to the government in terms of what are the things that we consider that should be improved in the reform. So far, I mean, we have a lot of expectations in terms of the final wording of the tax reform, and we are still analyzing. It has some positives, some other things that we don't like that much, but let's see what happen in Congress. Regarding the free zones, Juan Esteban, could you please comment on that? Yeah. Can you repeat that one, Rodrigo? I'd like to know how much of the revenue generated in Colombia is coming from the free zones. Out of those revenues, what percentage is currently going to exports? Okay. I think that Carlos Horacio can give you more color on that answer. Carlos, can you answer that one, please? Thank you, Juan. Hi, Rodrigo. In Colombia, the free zone accounts for about 40% of the volume. The split in the free zone is really 60% for exports and 40% for the local market. It's about 40% of the revenue in the volume, which is very close to 30% in terms of revenues. Thank you, Carlos. Okay, Rodrigo. Next question comes from Juan Camilo Dauder from Bancolombia. Hi, good morning. Can you listen to me? Yes, we can. Okay. Thank you. My question is in regards to Central America performance. We have seen a decrease in volumes by about 30% when comparing with the last year. In the report you mentioned, it is related to the operating difficulties in Haiti and the transition of the government of Honduras. You also mentioned that it has been a kind of recomposition of the ships you use for the exports operation, prioritizing Cartagena. What can we expect on the volumes of the region? Should we expect an increase during the rest of the year? Or do you think the situations, particularly in Haiti, Honduras, and the recomposition of trading are going to last? Thank you. Thank you, Juan Camilo. I mean, the reality is that in the local markets, I mean, the volumes decreased only 4%. The major decrease in volumes was in trading because first of all, Cartagena taking exports from trading. Second, lower volumes sold to third parties in the trading business. Third, more clinker sourced locally in the Dominican Republic instead of with trading. Third, because of the operational issues that we have been facing in Haiti that were solved already. Going forward, you can expect, I mean, better volumes in the second half of the year. I would like Gustavo to complement my answer and give you some more color on each of the markets in Central America and the Caribbean. Thank you, Juan. I think you had a very precise answer. My compliment would be, we're seeing important trends in Panama, which make us hopeful about the second quarter. Honduras has had some effect in the transition of the government. We do expect volumes to behave a little better on the second quarter, second half of the year, especially due to remittances, which are growing more than 20%. As Juan mentioned, we have already solved the operational issues, so we do expect volumes growing for the second half. We continue to see an important trend in the Dominican Republic. We do expect a better second half of the year in terms of volume in most of our markets. Thank you very much. You're welcome, Juan. We are taking another question that we have on the chat. It is from Mike Betts. He's asking, "Have your margin on imports fallen by more than on locally produced cement, given the increase also in freight rates, or have prices been increased more on import areas? Thank you for the question, Mike. I mean, on our exports from Cartagena, we made an additional price increase on our exports in June. I mean, margins should be better in the second half of the year. In terms of imports from trading going into some of our markets, margins have decreased because of the increase in freights. But with the revenue management strategy that we put in place, margins should be better in our local markets, depending on imports in the second half of the year. Thank you, Juan. We have no more questions. Okay. No, thank you all for attending our conference call, and looking forward to our third quarter conference call. Have a great day.